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Hollywood legend and Academy Award winner. Screen siren, businesswoman and AIDS activist. Yo-yo dieter and serial bride. Warhol subject and grist for the tabloids and paparazzi since she came to fame at age 12 as the star of 1944's National Velvet.

Elizabeth Taylor died this morning at age 79, reports ABC News and CNN.

Six weeks ago she entered treatment at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles for symptoms of congestive heart failure.

"She was surrounded by her children: Michael Wilding, Christopher Wilding, Liza Todd, and Maria Burton," said Taylor's publicist, Sally Morrison, in a statement, as reported by ABC News. Michael Wilding, in the same statement, said:

My Mother was an extraordinary woman who lived life to the fullest, with great passion, humor, and love. Though her loss is devastating to those of us who held her so close and so dear, we will always be inspired by her enduring contribution to our world. Her remarkable body of work in film, her ongoing success as a businesswoman, and her brave and relentless advocacy in the fight against HIV/AIDS, all make us all incredibly proud of what she accomplished. We know, quite simply, that the world is a better place for Mom having lived in it. Her legacy will never fade, her spirit will always be with us, and her love will live forever in our hearts.

Taylor once famously said, "I've been through it all, baby. I'm Mother Courage." She could, however, be considered Mother Hollywood, midwife to the town and culture we see played out in the tabloids, blogs and morning chat shows.

"Liz Taylor was Angelina before there was an Angelina," said Melissa Silverstein, who runs the feminist blog Women & Hollywood. Jolie, of course, being code for a hot, humanitarian husband-stealer. Taylor famously batted eyes at then-married Eddie Fisher, who she later wed (and divorced). She also helped bring HIV/AIDS consciousness into the mainstream back in the early 1980s, a signal of her deep friendship with Rock Hudson, who died from the disease in 1985. And, yes, like Jolie, Taylor was an adoptive mother.

An addict and alcoholic, she was Charlie Sheen before there was such a drug. She amassed a jewelry collection, which the Washington Post notes included a $1.05 million Cartier diamond and 33.19-carat Krupp diamond, well before Mary J. Blige told us, "My God is a God who wants me to have things. He wants me to bling."

In her hey-day in the 1960s she was one of the highest paid actresses, earning $1 million for Cleopatra, paving the way for today's generation of multi-million contracts for films headlined by women, such as Sandra Bullock, whose The Blind Side grossed some $310 million, and helped her earn $56 million between June 2009 and June 2010, according to Forbes.

In 1988 Taylor released her first perfume Passion, later putting the Liz Taylor name to a top-selling line of perfumes and cosmetics--well before "billionaire" Jessica Simpson and the dozens of other Hollywood A-listers, such as Sarah Jessica Parker or the Olsen Twins, with a licensing deal.

"She took the veneer off Hollywood," continues Silverstein. "She allowed us to come into Hollywood and into her battles with herself."